All Souls' Day

Next Sunday the Church celebrates the Feast of All Souls.  The Church prays for and remembers the faithful departed throughout the entire year. However, All Souls’ Day is the general, solemn, day of commemoration, when the Church remembers, prays for, and offers Masses for the faithful departed.

Christians have been praying for their departed brothers and sisters since the earliest days of Christianity. Early inscriptions on catacomb walls attest to the ancientness of prayers for the dead, even if the Church needed more time to develop a substantial theology behind the practice.

                                      

In the early Church, departed Christians' names were placed on diptychs – a hinged painting that closes like a book. In the sixth century, Benedictine communities held commemorations for the departed on the feast of Pentecost. All Souls' Day became a universal festival largely on account of these Benedictines.

The feast soon spread, and today all Western Catholics celebrate All Souls' Day on November 2^nd, as do many Anglicans, Lutherans, and other Christians. Initially many Protestant reformers rejected All Souls' Day because of the theology behind the feast (Purgatory and prayers/masses for the dead), but the feast is now being celebrated in many Protestant communities.

There are many customs associated with All Souls’ Day, and these vary greatly from culture to culture. In Mexico they celebrate All Souls’ Day as el dia de los muertos, or "the day of the dead." Customs include going to a graveyard to have a picnic, eating skull-shaped candy, and leaving food out for dead relatives. If all of this seems a little morbid, remember that all cultures deal with death in different manners. The Western aversion to anything related to death is not present in other cultures. In the Philippines, on the eve of All Souls’, partiers go door-to-door, requesting gifts and singing a traditional verse representing the liberation of holy souls from Purgatory. In Hungary, a common custom is inviting orphans into the family and giving them food, clothes, and toys. As a sign of welcome, Poles leave their windows and doors ajar on the night of All Souls’ Day for the spirits of their loved ones to come and visit.

At Mass next weekend, we ask all parishioners to bring a photograph of a loved one who has passed whose soul you would like lifted up.  We will pray for all the departed with our loved ones in our midst.

Praying for the dead goes back to the Hebrew Scriptures.  Saint Paul prayed for the dead and we continue to do so today.  For those who have died are changed, not gone, and continue to benefit by our prayers.